5:1 My son, to my wisdom be attentive, to understanding incline your ear,
5:2 That you may act discreetly, and your lips guard what you know.
5:3 Indeed, the lips of the stranger drip honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil;
5:4 But in the end she is as bitter as wormwood, as sharp as a two-edged sword.
5:5 Her feet go down to death, her steps reach Sheol;
5:6 Her paths ramble, you know not where, lest you see before you the road to life.
5:7 So now, children, listen to me, do not stray from the words of my mouth.
5:8 Keep your way far from her, do not go near the door of her house,
5:9 Lest you give your honor to others, and your years to a merciless one;
5:10 Lest outsiders take their fill of your wealth, and your hard-won earnings go to another’s house;
5:11 And you groan in the end, when your flesh and your body are consumed;
5:12 And you say, “Oh, why did I hate instruction, and my heart spurn reproof!
5:13 Why did I not listen to the voice of my teachers, incline my ear to my instructors!
5:14 I am all but ruined, in the midst of the public assembly!”
5:15 Drink water from your own cistern, running water from your own well.
5:16 Should your water sources be dispersed abroad, streams of water in the streets?
5:17 Let them be yours alone, not shared with outsiders;
5:18 Let your fountain be blessed and have joy of the wife of your youth,
5:19 your lovely hind, your graceful doe. Of whose love you will ever have your fill, and by her ardor always be intoxicated.
5:20 Why then, my son, should you be intoxicated with a stranger, and embrace another woman?
5:21 Indeed, the ways of each person are plain to the Lord’s sight; all their paths he surveys;
5:22 By their own iniquities the wicked will be caught, in the meshes of their own sin they will be held fast;
5:23 They will die from lack of discipline, lost because of their great folly.
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